Hey, sorry I've been out of the loop but I have been monitoring things from the hospital, which brings me to what has happened this week in the life of my 37 year old son.

Micah was rushed to the emergency room early last Monday with a drug overdose. He was unresponsive and there was concern that a lack of oxygen might have caused permanent damage. It's a long story that I'll tell you about later, but Jesus had mercy on him. They put him on a ventilator and for 2 days he could not respond to any commands. Tuesday night they announced a "code blue" which meant that he required resuscitation. The whole staff was in the room and for awhile it looked pretty bad.

I really can't explain what happened next but during the midst of this I knew that he was going to pull through. Like I said, I can't explain it, but during this time my faith in God concerning what was happening was actually strengthened. DW (dear wife) and I had pretty much acknowledged to God that we were prepared for whatever was going to happen and we put it all in God's hands. Well, to make a long story short, as God encouraged me, I walked out to the waiting room and told my wife and a friend that I thought that we should not give up on this situation and that I believed that God wasn't ready for him to go. In a few minutes they got him stabilized.

We continued to pray but there was an almost surreal peace that settled in both of our hearts. It was almost like the trial had finished and we were just waiting for him to wake up.

I should say that the doctor in charge, earlier that day, had come in and basically prepared us for the worst. He asked us about whether or not they were to go to any means to keep him alive. He said that since there had been significant oxygen deprivation the likelihood of brain damage was extremely high and they might be able to put a tube in his neck and keep him alive but he would need to be in an institution. I think he based this on a MRI scan (I'm not sure of the terminology but I think that this was the test). He also said that he had suffered a stroke on both sides of the brain(??) and that this had cause a heart attack (or maybe a heart attack had caused the stroke --I really can't remember which caused which but it was all due to the lack of oxygen-- he had been unconscious for multiple hours).

There were huge blisters on his ankles where he had lain without moving for a significant amount of time, 8-20 hours is what they surmised based upon the deterioration of the flesh.

I know I said I was going to keep this short but I'd like to write this down so that I'll never forget the sequence of events.

As I said, the doctor had given us this information before Tuesday night's "code blue". At the time I told him that my wife and I both didn't want him to live by artificial means but since we didn't know what the Lord had in mind we were not at that point ready to sign anything. After all, if he was going to die then he could have died well before the 911 call. I know that God doesn't play games with his people and the very fact that Micah was alive at that point was enough to convince me that it wasn't over. Even on the drive up we had pretty much settled it in our minds that we were going to yield to the sovereignty of God and because of the circumstances (that Micah had freely chosen) we were ready to let him go.

But since God hadn't allowed him to die to that point, and since there wasn't any need for Him to "teach us a lesson" (we had already yielded to His will in the matter) and since Micah was in no condition to be "taught a lesson" this got us to the point of thinking that God had more planned for Micah and in an odd sort of way this encouraged us.

I should say that there was one encouraging thing that happened on Tuesday (after we got the discouraging news from the doctor and after they had attempted to wake him from the sedatives with nothing but primitive responses from Micah, i.e. he fought the restraints with his hands and feet but did not respond to any attempts to obey commands --which might have indicated brain function...) ... the neurologist came in later in the day (before the "code blue") and said that he thought Micah's brain was going to be okay. DW was incredulous and told him that this was the first time anyone had offered ANYTHING that was positive! He just looked at us and said "but I'm the Neurologist" in a matter of fact kind of way... we could have kissed him at that point!

Anyway, that night was when the "code-blue" alert was given and things looked like they were turning for the worse. This was when the odd sense of encouragement came over me and I conveyed this to my wife and a friend. DW said later that when I spoke the words something in her clicked as well and we experienced a turning point --not concerning the physical circumstances that Micah was going through but the turning point was in our faith. We started to fight against the situation rather than merely acquiesce to the circumstances before us.

The next morning they attempted again to wake him up by stopping the sedatives and when he opened his eyes he saw DW and she immediately asked him if he knew who she was and he nodded!!!! Praise Jesus! The nurses who had previously given him commands (they had repeated asked him to give a "thumbs up" without a response) tried to get him to respond and he started to do just that!! The rest of the day (Wednesday) he was in and out of consciousness but it was obvious that his brain was functioning!

Thursday morning we walked in and they had removed the ventilator tubes and he was breathing on his own--All Glory to Jesus!

He was able to drink some liquid and steadily progressed through Friday. They wanted to do some type of test but because of the weekend they scheduled it for Monday, so we decided to head back home Saturday (something we we wouldn't have dreamed of doing earlier in the week!) and go back Monday morning. We left him in the good hands of his friends and family and just got home this afternoon.

Anyway, we appreciate all of your prayers and trust that God will be glorified in this whole situation.